Mr. Diamandis, a driving force behind the Ansari X-Prize competition to spur non-governmental space flight, has long discussed his goal to become an asteroid miner

as long as their goal is not to just make money... The Spanish had an economic crash that affected much of the known world of the day when they brought large amounts of gold from South America and devalued the price of gold. My quote above is because I know that they figure diamonds to likely be a common thing on bodies in space and Mr. Diamandis has a suggestive name.